


Love Is the Plot

by folderol



Series: After Lucille [2]
Category: Crimson Peak (2015)
Genre: Alternate Ending, F/M, Falling In Love, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Incest, Sexual Content, Thomas also has serious self-esteem issues, Thomas is alive, mostly happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 05:27:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,235
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5527718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/folderol/pseuds/folderol
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Paris, 1902.</i>
</p><p>They knew nothing of his past, only the beauty of the Jardin du Luxembourg.</p><p>Thomas resisted the temptation of nostalgia. He took her advice; he did not look to the past.</p><p>Until a book entitled <i>Crimson Peak</i> fell into his lap.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Is the Plot

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sequel to my earlier story, _[Every Ghost Story Is a Love Story](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5302892)_. That story serves as a useful backstory from Edith's POV, but it's not necessary to read that first.
> 
> In that story, Thomas survives Lucille's attack and sees Edith and Alan walking away from Allerdale together. He assumes that Edith no longer cares for him.
> 
> This is what happens afterwards.

* * *

The love within us and the love without

Are mixed, confounded; if we are loved or love,

We scarce distinguish. So, with other power.

Being acted on and acting seem the same:

In that first onrush of life's chariot-wheels,

We know not if the forests move or we.

\- Elizabeth Barrett Browning, _Aurora Leigh_  

* * *

 

He did not expect to be content, residing in a musty Parisian attic that was chilly in the wintertime and sweltering in the summertime. He did not think it possible that he could enjoy city life, with its abundance of of unpleasant, overheated stenches and unexpected noises -- he, who grew up in a lonely manor on the silent moors. Instead of having uninterrupted stretches of time to think and tinker at Allerdale, he was waking up early, to work at a film studio in Montreuil, where he was constantly following orders from the director, about the appearance of shadows, about the disappearance of lights, and he would return late in the evening to collapse onto his threadbare bed. Then, altogether too soon, he would rise again for another working day.

Thomas had never earned an honest living before. He never thought he would, having been born a baronet. These strange circumstances, the fresh sensation of being told what to do and being paid for his inventiveness and intuition and initiative, consumed his life. He felt he had no time to reflect and was strangely satisfied by this thought.

His father would have been shocked at the thought of his son _working_ like this. Middle-class boys dreamed of careers; upper-class men without fortune were expected to marry well. Thomas did not think much of it. It was a brand new century. The old aristocracy had fallen and he was a new man.

Of course, it has to be said that he was not free -- like all others, he was bound to the chains of money. He needed money. But he had never felt so _free_ , so far from the judgment of those who had reigned over his life before: his abusive father, his cruel mother, and his sister. His sister.

Here, people were different. They chuckled at his English accent; they guffawed almost politely as he stumbled over the pronunciation of metro stations, the screech of the shiny train cars masking some of his embarrassment. They thought him charming, another foreigner drawn to the charms of Paris. Someone who had come to seek _la belle vie_. How _charmant_ , an English aristocrat, a new bohemian!

They knew nothing of his past, only the beauty of the Jardin du Luxembourg.

He resisted the temptation of nostalgia. He took her advice; he did not look to the past.

To him, thinking about the past was like opening Pandora’s Box.

Thomas did not recognize the change within him for quite a long time. A year after Lucille’s death, he realized he was lonely, but oddly content in Paris.

 

* * *

 

Then, one rainy day -- he remembered this distinctly, for he had lost his _parapluie_ \-- he had taken shelter underneath the eaves of a bookstore. Through the glass, Thomas could see the storekeeper frowning. Thomas stepped inside, to play the part of a potential customer.

He thought to peruse through the shelves. The rain would let up soon. His rudimentary French, stunted after his family governess abruptly abandoned Allerdale when he was ten years old, told him that nearly all of the titles were beyond his reading ability.

“Pardon, monsieur? Vous avez des livres en anglais?” he nervously asked the foreboding man at the counter.

The bookseller pointed at a small table stacked with a few titles. Thomas reluctantly walked over and peered at the selection.

Prominent was a familiar name, branded on the cover of one of the books: _Edith Cushing_.

Thomas felt a little dazed as he picked up the book with a shaking hand. The book was entitled _Crimson Peak_.

This was when Thomas’ second life truly began.

 

* * *

 

He had shoved money into the hands of the astonished bookseller and ran through the soaked streets of Paris, slipping twice on the way back home.

Thomas flew through the pages of Edith’s book that evening. He read and read, by the single flickering lamp on his nightstand, unaware of the lumpy bed underneath him and the shatteringly noisy rain outside. He was transfixed in another world, Edith’s world.

Just as the faint dawn began to emerge through the single attic window, his heart nearly stopped as he read these words:

_"I looked at him for the last time, now without doubt that he loved me. I reached out a trembling hand towards his ghost, frightened only by the thought that suddenly arose in my head: I loved him too."_

He shut the book with an echoing snap and turned onto his side, his limbs tense, his mind on fire with possibilities.

 _I loved him too_.

Thomas did not deserve the feeling that rushed inside him, the singular adrenaline of feeling loved.

 _Crimson Peak_ was a love letter. To _him_.

 

* * *

 

He did not know when she would return.

He did not know how she would react when she saw him stationed outside of her home in New York.

He called her name when he saw her. She was wearing a bright coat and her cheeks were bright as well, from recent tears. She turned around and stared.

Then she fainted.

 

* * *

 

He felt so inelegant beside her, in his worn suit. She was elaborately dressed as always, but the tailored emerald gown she wore underneath her coat was more subdued than the overdone dresses she had worn at Allerdale. _She looked sophisticated_ , he thought. _Older. More mature._

She slid closer to him. He was stiffly seated on the sofa in her bedroom. It had been ages since he had entered a room so luxuriously furnished. As the tense silence continued, he pretended to admire the room and spied a used bandage on her mahogany nightstand.

She had kept it. It was the makeshift bandage she had wrapped around his bleeding hand, after he had injured himself whilst testing that damned mining contraption at Allerdale.

 _She had kept it_.

He summoned the courage to look at her, and was startled by the determination in her eyes.

She leaned in. She finally placed her lips on his. He had been unprepared, his lips were dry, but he did not retreat.

She wanted him closer, laying her soft hands on the nape of his neck. Her long, satiny hair -- let down at some point -- brushed his fingers as he stroked her cheek.

After a long moment, they parted. They remained sitting there, each savoring the other’s familiar scent, lingering in the same position, eyes closed. He could feel her breath on his chin -- just a fraction of an inch away from joining her lips with his again --

Edith abruptly sat back. He felt a slight jolt of disappointment -- _she doesn’t want me_ , he thought wildly -- before she touched his collar, tugging at the top button. She began working her way down his shirt, again with that fiery, concentrated look on her face.

“Edith, are you sure you want to do this?”

“Of course,” she murmured, still unbuttoning.

“Oh,” he whispered. He felt dizzy.

“Shh.”

She slid a warm hand underneath his shirt, gently taking it off.

The sense of unreality did not let up as Edith continued to undress him. Something in him stirred as Edith guided his trousers off. Somehow they both fell onto the bed, entwined, Edith underneath him. There was a rush of movement as Edith scrambled to take her lovely gown off -- a rush, _a rush_ … the rest of the night rushed away, his mind enraptured, his body unable to capture each tingle that ran down his spine, each wonderful sensation...

 _I love you_ , he thought. In retrospect, he was uncertain whether or not he had said this sacred phrase out loud to her that night, but he kept thinking:

 _I love you_.

 

* * *

 

Thomas had been busy of late, running to and from the studio. He knew that she wanted to explore more of Paris, so he took her to the flower market. Thomas had often strolled here, gazed at the roses and the tulips, in his lonely days. Back then, he had neither the money with which to purchase flowers, nor a lady to offer them to.

Today, he could offer lilies to Edith. She blushed as she took them, turning rosy in a way only Edith could.

It was an hour or so after church service had ended and the streets were packed with throngs of shoppers. For a city with so many churches, its people were not particularly observant. Thomas and Edith made their way through the street market, taking their time to inspect the pure, passionate color of the roses. Edith took particular pleasure in sniffing them. She lingered on their scent, eyes alight.

The pair walked towards the park where Thomas once spent his Sundays alone. The sun was out, peeking underneath scattered clouds, but the grass still hid pockets of dew. They strode, hand in hand, towards the Seine. Families with rowdy children chasing one another threatened to interrupt their peace, but Thomas did not mind. Neither he nor Edith spoke. They did not look at each other. But he thought, rather spontaneously: _I am happy here_.

He glanced at her, but she did not notice. She was smiling at the playful children and their games by the riverside. He thought her beautiful, with her curious, lively eyes, her kind demeanor. Her alternately gentle and striking sense of humor, her strong sense of right and wrong. Her idealism. All this -- all these features -- captured within the moment he laid eyes on her at her father’s office that fateful day in Buffalo.

Thomas and Lucille had been well-versed in judging people, scanning for any weaknesses, he thought suddenly. It was a family trait: his parents had taken advantage of it on their own children, the children exacted revenge in turn. The siblings used it to hold onto Allerdale, in judging young heiresses ripe for the picking. They saw Edith and her wealth and her innocence, judged her too quickly for their own good.

He felt so sinful, so tainted next to her. He could not help but feel a sense of guilt when she curled up to him during the night; he would tense up, unable to sleep until she turned away. He did not understand why she trusted him so, from the very beginning.

Lucille had often disdained people like Edith, people like the milkman who took for granted that the Sharpes would pay him back, month after month -- she had openly mocked him. Thomas had taken Lucille’s prejudices and judgments as his own.

It was so odd to be without her, odd to have lost this second conscience that had guided him for well over twenty years. She was a part of him -- he was a part of her.

 _Lucille_.

His eyes suddenly moistened. Edith, with a writer’s attentiveness, immediately saw and whispered, leaning in: “Thomas, what’s wrong?”

He closed his eyes, shying from her gaze. One day, perhaps, he would talk about Lucille. But he was afraid of overflowing with grief, knowing well that Edith could not possibly share his feelings for his sister. She could not relate with the grief of losing a sibling; she had none to begin with.

Edith did not know Lucille as he did.

Thomas dared not show her the intensity of emotion he felt for Lucille. Her grace, her wit, the hidden sensuality she could reveal when they were alone -- the specific secrets of her skin, the never-to-be-repeated whispers when they were entwined. Thomas might tell Edith and she might ruin his vision of Lucille, because she did not realize how important, how beloved, Lucille was to him. Or she might see her too clearly, more concisely than he did, and she might unconsciously steal her for her own writing. She had done this once already.

Edith suddenly gripped his hand, startling him. He looked at her, and she stared right back at him, with a forceful glint in her eye.

“I know,” she said.

“You do?”

“Yes,” she replied quietly. “Well, I don’t _actually_ know, but I can guess. And I’m sorry, Thomas. I’m so sorry.”

Although she could not know -- would _never_ know -- the best of Lucille, Thomas was nevertheless touched by her depth of empathy. He said nothing. Edith courteously looked away as he exhaled a well-deserved sigh.

They sat down on a bench by the water. Edith took out her battered notebook and her favorite pen, as Thomas absentmindedly watched the Parisian families around them.

After a while, he glanced at Edith. She was scribbling furiously, absorbed in the world she was creating.

“What are you writing, darling?”

She looked up and smiled. Her nose was smudged with ink.

“I’m not at a stage where I feel comfortable telling anyone yet,” she said coyly.

“Oh? No spoilers even for me?” he replied, circling a protective arm around her. He leaned in, breathing in her scent as he kissed her on the forehead.

She laughed.

“I can tell you this: love is the plot,” she told him. “Writing this story feels very different from writing _Crimson Peak_. I know more about it now.”

He smiled. “About love?”

“Yes,” she said, smiling back.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Title stolen from Francine Prose's review of the movie _Carol_. I thought it was a beautiful phrase and it's very appropriate for Edith to appropriate.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed this story!


End file.
